


Crown: A Deathfic

by loosenoodlepoodledoodle



Series: Meaningful Works [7]
Category: April (Band), Weki Meki (Band)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Tragedy, Coronavirus, Deathfic, Existential Crisis, F/F, Hurts So Good, K-pop References, LGBTQ Themes, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-11
Updated: 2020-03-11
Packaged: 2021-02-22 22:23:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,378
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23101324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loosenoodlepoodledoodle/pseuds/loosenoodlepoodledoodle
Summary: Things are getting really bad in Seoul (for plot reasons). Chaekyung and the others decide to flee the city. Unfortunately, that means bringing Chaekyung's unrequited heart along for the ride.
Relationships: Kim Chaewon / Yoon Chaekyung, Lee Naeun / Kim Doyeon
Series: Meaningful Works [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1672393
Kudos: 2





	Crown: A Deathfic

**Author's Note:**

> They're actually not bad at all, I can't believe how much the situation has improved over the last few days. Long live the Republic! (Of Korea!)

The car door opens almost violently. Rachel scoots over to make room, and Yena climbs in, helped by Chaewon. Even with the mask and sunglasses covering her face, I can tell we just made a big mistake.

“There’s no room,” says Chaewon, “You’ll have to sit up front.”

She closes the door, and Jinsol walks all the way around to my side. I have to unbuckle myself and sit in the middle, sardined between her and Naeun, who is still staring wide-eyed into the rearview mirror like she just witnessed a murder.

“It’ll be fine!” insists Chaewon. “You wouldn’t want us to leave _you_ behind!”

She’s got a point. The city’s falling apart right now, although outwardly it is strangely peaceful. There’s probably no way to avoid it anyway, but still. We’ve been afraid for so long that it’s still a shock being exposed to someone infected like this. If Yena’s infected. But who am I kidding, the thing’s spreading like wildfire and every other disease is probably on vacation right now.

Naeun shifts out of park and drives us away, slowly at first. Everything feels so surreal right now. The city looks empty, but I know that behind nearly every apartment window there must be at least one person sick, or too terrified to leave home. There are only delivery drivers out, and whatever minimum number of utility workers required to keep Seoul from drowning in its own refuse. The only places with pedestrians now are the sidewalks outside of hospitals, and I can tell that Naeun is avoiding passing by those. It’s too depressing. People are dying, waiting for days for care that’ll never come.

There aren’t even enough soldiers and cops available to enforce quarantines. Not that it’d matter. Once things got out of control, the government decided there wasn’t much point. You’d have to be living far out in the countryside, where not even the trains run, to avoid getting sick now. And the odds are still that you’re going to get sick. In fact, the only real reason to leave town is that rural areas will have more food, both because they have farms, and because there are far fewer mouths to feed.

But also…there’s something to be said about spending time in the mountains and the woods. If you think you’re going to die, that is.

Naeun turns onto the entrance ramp for the highway. I hear Yena breathing heavily behind me. She’s not wearing a sealed mask (none of us are), and her breath tickles the back of my neck. As Naeun pulls up to the kiosk to grab the toll ticket, Jinsol sneezes. Her mask fails to stop a gentle sprinkle of saliva from dousing my hand. She is immediately apologetic, checking the glovebox for sanitizer.

Unfortunately, we ran out of it yesterday, and half the whole country is sold out.

***

We arrive at our destination in the evening, a love motel in the middle of nowhere. The road it is on dead-ends a few hundred meters up the valley. Most of the neighborhood is a little-visited national park. Down the road the other way, beyond the underpass, are a gas station and 7-11. Past them are fields and a village, and all the way in the distance are apartment towers. The valley floor is amazingly flat, but the hills rise steeply, almost to the grandeur of mountains.

I kind of like it.

“We’re on our own,” says Naeun as she returns from the front desk. “The manager left us a note, and some bottled water.”

“They’re not going to be here?” asks Rachel.

Naeun shakes her head, looking haggard. In fact she looks just how I feel. We’ve all got symptoms now, except for Chaewon. I look at her, and she looks back, taking off her mask.

“I guess we don’t need these anymore, unless we have to go out.”

She’s right. We all bare our faces. Yena looks worse than she sounds. Chaewon has to help her to our rooms.

The motel is built for scenic views, and we get the best in the house. Fifth floor, huge windows looking up the valley. The interior design is a bit kinky, and the mirrors on the walls and ceiling are going to be pretty awful when stepping out of bed in the middle of the night. But I’m kind of happy to be here. We’ve been together for so long, it would be heartbreaking to face this without them.

One of the rooms is across the hall, its window facing the other way, back towards town. It’s brighter here, and we mutually agree that this should be our meeting place for meals and any other such group activities. Yena’s really out of sorts so we put her up in this room so she won’t need to move around as much and before I can think to suggest otherwise Chaewon volunteers to stay with her. Which makes sense, I mean it was her idea to rescue Yena before we bailed out of the capital. But I’m selfish. I’m really hurt by her choice, and the thing is she can never know why.

Instead I shack up with Naeun, and Jinsol with Rachel. We bid each other good night, then go to our rooms. There’s only the one bed, large and very comfortable. Naeun and I try it out and are surprised at how quiet it is. We bounce up and down on it, and nary a squeak is produced. Then we look at each other and burst out laughing.

“We should get the rest of our stuff now. In case we’re not feeling very good in the morning,” says Naeun. I agree, and I’ve also got this weird burst of energy I need to spend. Otherwise I might not sleep tonight.

It takes several trips to bring all the supplies up, and we stack them in the hallway. The water is the heaviest, and absolutely wipes us out. The motel has an elevator, but the manager must have shut it off when they abandoned this place and forgotten to turn it back on for us.

I let Naeun shower first. I sit on the floor, leaning against the bed when I nearly nod off. I realize she’s taking a long time, and shout to see if she’s okay.

“Yes, sorry! It just feels really good in here.”

Soon she steps out in a towel and I take my turn. She’s right, it feels amazing. It’s certainly easier to breathe, and I sit relaxed, back against the wall. I’m kind of surprised there’s no bathtub. A love motel would seem to be the perfect place for them, but maybe I’m wrong. Maybe the normal customers here would want to leave quickly, since they would be charged by the hour.

The showerhead is of the kind connected to the water supply by a sort of metal hose. It’s the kind you can take hold of and point wherever you need it most. This is the only place I’ll have any time alone while we’re here. We could’ve each taken separate rooms, but we didn’t want to be by ourselves during this ordeal.

I think of Chaewon when I grab the showerhead off its mount.

***

Naeun looks at me funny while I’m putting my pajamas on. I think she knows what I was up to. I crawl into bed, and she rolls over onto her side to face me. I skip a beat, then say, “Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.” She doesn’t roll back over.

I reach out and turn off the light. As I settle in, I can feel her staring at me, grinning like a sphinx. Finally I ask her, “What?”

She waits before answering me. “You know what.”

I remark drily, “This is why you don’t have any friends, Naeun. You’re too smart for your own good.”

She bolts upright and gets out of bed, coughing. When she clears up enough, she says, “And this is why you’re still single, Chaekyung.”

She leaves, letting the door shut hard. I am stunned at her words, but also my own. What was I thinking, saying that? I mean, I wasn’t that mad at her for silently teasing me. And that might have been the worst thing I could possibly say.

It’s as much my disappointment in myself as the disease that keeps me up most of the night. I’m starting to ache all over, and I have to cough and sneeze. I throw off the covers, only to shiver and pull them back. I’m thankful, though, because I don’t seem to have pneumonia yet.

I wake up late the next morning. I go across the hall to find everyone waiting to eat. We all look tired, thought Naeun is still pissed and the only open place to sit is across the table from her. She deliberately ignores me, instead paying close attention to her phone. She’s gotten rather pallid, but nowhere near as bad as Yena. Meanwhile, the other three are having much milder symptoms than I, and I start to think we’re going to get lucky. This new strain is much more virulent than the last, that’s why we developed symptoms so quickly. But maybe it’s already burned itself out, or something. I didn’t exactly major in epidemiology at Sungshin University.

“Can we watch television while we eat?” asks Yena.

Chaewon puts on some K-drama while we make noodle cups. There’s a microwave oven in here that wasn’t last night. I think I remember it being in the office downstairs, though. I’m about to ask Naeun about it when I remember how mean I was to her. I really ought to apologize, but I’m stubborn, and also probably selfish and a coward.

I try to look at her out of the corner of my eye. She’s texting someone, and I lean over slightly to try and see who it is. I just catch glimpse of the name _Kim Doyeon_ when she snatches it back, glaring at me. Then she storms off.

Yena and Chaewon aren’t paying attention, but Rachel and Jinsol exchange a look. Naeun must have joined them in their room last night. What did she tell them?

***

“I’m so bored,” says Jinsol.

“No one’s stopping you from running around outside,” says Chaewon.

Our maknae smiles and leaps to her feet, turning around to give Rachel a hand. They set their empty noodle cups on the table and leave. Part of me wants to join them, but I’m sure they’re going to invite Naeun on their hike or whatever, and I’m not ready to face her just yet. Besides, Yena’s nodded off, and Chaewon’s turned down the TV. Maybe I can talk to her. Feel her out a little. See if there’s even the tiniest chance that she…might…reciprocate my feelings…

“How are you feeling?” asks Chaewon.

I blush, a response that I would find immediately suspicious. “Oh, I’m fine. Just a little sick.”

Chaewon comes over, moving Naeun’s chair to right in front of me. From there she feels my forehead.

“You’ve got a fever.”

“Oh? I guess I do.”

She gently probes the rest of my face as well as my neck with her soft, delicate hands.

“Any other symptoms?”

_I’m madly in love with you, babe. Head over heels._ “Just coughing and sneezing.”

“Well, hopefully you don’t get any worse.” She pulls her hands back, but I take them in my own.

“How are you being so fearless?”

She’s taken aback. “Fearless? I’m plenty afraid, Chaekyung.”

“You don’t act like it.”

“That’s because I don’t let myself worry. I can’t control everything that’s going on, so why worry about those things?”

“That’s really admirable,” I say.

“Thanks.” She gestures to the dozing Yena. “Besides, if I let myself give in, I might break down completely. Then there would’ve been no point coming out here at all.”

She’s so steady, I can’t believe I’m the leader of April and not her. Her courage inspires me to take a chance. Not to speak; I’m not ready for that. But if I can drop a hint, maybe she won’t reject me outright.

I change the way I’m holding her hands, gently stroking them with my palms. I give her a look that I hope conveys the longing I feel. Evidently it works, just not the way I wanted. She jerks back in the chair, looking away quickly. My heart plummets, only to give a start when the door opens and Rachel and Jinsol come barging back in.

“Naeun’s gone,” says Jinsol.

Chaewon stands up. “What do you mean?”

“Her bags are gone, and so is the car,” says Rachel.

I stand and lean over the table to look out the window. Sure enough, the parking lot is now empty.

“Did you call her?” asks Chaewon.

“Yes,” says Jinsol, “and she’s turned off her phone.”

Chaewon looks confused. “Why on earth would she leave like that?”

Slowly, Rachel and Jinsol point at me, and I have to cry.

***

There’s a knock on the door. “Can I come in?” asks Chaewon.

I get up, wiping my bleary eyes and opening the way for her. I sit down in a chair by the window. She sits on the bed.

“Don’t blame yourself.”

I look down at my hands, then out the window. Rachel and Jinsol are hiking up a path behind the motel.

“Do you need any Tylenol?”

“No. Save it for later.” Who knows what tomorrow will bring.

Chaewon tucks me into bed, and I’m sorry to see her leave. The door shuts and the room goes quiet. Daylight peeks in from around the curtains, but I’m asleep before my eyes can adjust to the gloom.

I dream about Chaewon and I. We’re on the set of a historical drama. I’m wearing pink and white 한복, and she’s wearing gold and red. She looks beautiful.

“Have you memorized your lines?” I ask her.

“Well enough, I suppose,” she replies, “but I should think we can afford a few mistakes, at least at first.”

I grow quiet. “I love you,” I whisper, but she doesn’t hear.

A voice calls out, “Action!” but I can see no crew nearby. The cast appears around us as if by magic, and I realize that we are just extras in this tale. So I step closer to Chaewon and whisper right in her ear.

“I love you.”

She flinches, frowns, and becomes teary-eyed. Before I can apologize, before I can beg her forgiveness, there is a commotion. The crowd parts and 배두나 points at us in fear. I feel myself growing cold, a horrible feeling rising in my throat. Red flows over the gilt of Chaewon’s dress, and I realize just what show we’re on when I awaken, coughing up a storm.

It’s so dark in here now, and I cry out, “Hello?” in alarm. For a moment of silence, I only hear the pounding of my heart in my head. Then I hear the door open, and I’m blinded as the lights come on.

“Are you alright?” asks Chaewon. “You’ve been asleep all day. You missed lunch and dinner.”

This makes me hungry. “Can you bring some food? I’m feeling really out of it.”

She comes closer and puts her hand on my forehead. “You’d better take that Tylenol this time, too.”

Rachel and Jinsol poke their heads in.

“Good evening,” says Rachel.

“How was your day, sleepyhead?” asks Jinsol.

I blink, still adjusting to the light. “Sleepy.”

They laugh, as Chaewon leaves to fetch the pills and my late supper.

“I think I saw you two this morning,” I say. “Did you go on a hike?”

“Oh, yes,” says Jinsol. “It was nice. We can take you up there in the morning, we found—”

_“Come quick!”_

Chaewon’s tortured call for help gives me the shivers. The other two rush to join her, but my head is too woozy to follow. I end up slumped on the floor at the foot of the bed. I don’t even need to hear the frantic conversation across the way to figure out what has happened.

Yena’s dead.

***

We cry, but in our shock cannot sustain it. We sit in my room until well after the mortuary team has left. They were able to reactivate the elevator on their own, so at least we won’t need to take the stairs anymore.

Eventually, Rachel and Jinsol drift away back to their quarters. Chaewon lingers in mine, because really they’re hers now, too. This is the only other place left for her to stay.

I look over at her, and she gets to her feet. “You still need to eat, don’t you, Chaekyung?”

I tell her so. Soon enough she’s back, and she snacks on a Chocopie while I wolf down my food. We both finish, and it’s time.

She crawls into bed with me after she turns out the lights. We don’t say goodnight to each other, but once she’s settled I can’t help myself, and put my arm around her middle. She cringes at first, then slowly relaxes. I don’t have the nerve to say it.

She falls asleep quickly, having been awake all day. I fear I shall be up all night, but this disease exhausts me, and before long I lose all sense of my self once more. This time no nightmare strikes me crudely in my mind’s eye, and I only remember a perhaps misplaced feeling of contentedness in the morning.

We have sweat through the sheets, however.

“I don’t think there are any more linens,” says Chaewon, slowly, “and they don’t do their own laundry here on site.”

“If we leave them open to the air all day, they’ll dry out sooner or later.”

We do this, then join the other two in their room for breakfast. After that, we get dressed without showering. That can wait until after the hike.

Jinsol takes the lead. It’s tough going because of our illness, but luckily we don’t have very high or far to go. There’s a clearing, a kind of flat shelf in the densely wooded hillside, one replete with a picnic area. We sit down together, looking down at the valley not so far below. I lean back, resting on the soft ground, when I see something behind me. Farther up, in smaller clearings like this one, are round, grassy green mounds capped with carved, white stone.

Old graves.

“Are any of you feeling any worse?” asks Chaewon.

“No,” we tell her, and it’s mostly true. For me, at least. Unless you count feelings apart from symptoms, like abject numbness, and the dull psychic aching inside.

“Don’t keep it to yourself, if they do get worse…”

“Chaewon, she was asleep,” says Rachel. “There was nothing we could do.”

But we can all see Chaewon doesn’t believe it.

“I was right next to her. I hadn’t even been asleep for very long.”

“Please, stop,” says Jinsol. She does.

“Did anyone tell her family?” I ask. No one replies, which is an answer all the same.

“I’ll do it,” says Rachel, and I’m grateful because I don’t have it in me to contact them, and I also don’t want Chaewon to have to go through it either. She’s blaming herself, when the only thing that would’ve been different is that Yena perishes outside a hospital instead of among friends.

“Should we tell Naeun?” asks Jinsol. “I mean, where did she go, anyway?”

“I think she went to see Kim Doyeon,” I say.

Jinsol hunches up her shoulders. “I guess I’ll text her, then.”

As we continue to sit, I start to wonder about what will happen when we’re gone. If we were to join the dead farther up the hillside, and one day rise up out of the earth, what would I see in this valley below? Field returned to forest, or a blistering desert? A new bay, flooded by the vengeful sea, and the motel a prime beach resort? Or maybe ground to dust under the hulking mass of the next ice age, a hundred thousand years in the future? With no part of me left to show that I ever existed?

***

We don’t go any higher, and are back in our rooms in time for lunch. We turn on the TV as a distraction, but the only thing on is _Infinity War_ , so that doesn’t last long. When we’re done, we separate into our pairs again, leaving me alone with Chaewon.

It’s something I want, but not while haunted by tragedy.

The bedsheets have dried, but before we can crawl back in we need to clean ourselves up. I offer to go second, to give her her privacy, but she surprises me.

“Let’s just go together. I mean, we’re just gonna end up sitting on the floor through most of it, right? And I don’t have the energy to wash all by myself.”

It’s nothing I haven’t seen before, but it’s different all the same. She’s right, we have to help each other out, otherwise nothing would get done. We rinse off, then sit cramped together on the floor, the pleasant spray of water dousing our legs. It’s like being in a relaxing sauna.

“How long have you felt this way?” asks Chaewon.

I gulp. “I think, maybe since the first time I met you. But it didn’t get strong until our hiatus. When we were at university together.”

She nods. “I’ve always liked you, Princess,” she admits, using my nickname for myself. “I’ve just been holding back all this time. Partly it’s because I was raised that way. I was also afraid what everyone else might think.”

“Naeun’s teasing probably didn’t help.”

“Yeah, you’re right.”

“I wonder how she’s taking the news,” I say. “She was never really close with any of us.”

Chaewon looks a little wistful. “I’m sure that whatever she’s feeling right now, it involves grinding between Kim Doyeon’s legs.”

I want to laugh, but I can’t. Instead, I lean in, kissing Chaewon on the cheek. As I pull back, she turns her head, and plants her own right on my mouth. The fact that we’re sitting together naked while she does it provides an irresistible kink to the act.

We struggle to our feet, the contact of our flesh giving me goosebumps. They are made all the worse when we shut off the water and open the shower door. The bathroom feels freezing in comparison. We towel each other off and crawl into bed without dressing. I would have liked to get physical, except the chill has leeched desire right out of me. Oh well. It’s only the afternoon. We’ll probably wake up sweaty in the middle of the night, and can finish each other off then. If only we can forget our despair.

As I lay there with my arms around Chaewon’s middle, I think about Yena. Where is she now? The obvious answer is the morgue, but it’s not what I mean. Heaven? Hell? Somewhere in between? But lie to myself as much as I want, I know the real answer is probably nowhere at all.

I dream of her when I finally fall asleep. It’s night time, and I’m back up the hill at the picnic clearing. The sky is radiant with stars. They mix with the gaudy neons of the love motel, and the dwellings far beyond. The graves on the heights above me are lit by candles; they look as though they are islands suspended in the void. There’s a new grave right here with me, and I see her standing there next to her engraved name: Yang Yena.

I go to her, and she’s not surprised to see me.

“Why are you so sad, Chaekyung?”

Because you’re dead, Yena. Because we lost you.

“Don’t feel sad for me, Chaekyung. Feel sad for the living. They still have to put up with all that bullshit.”

How can you say that?

“Because I’m dead. I’m a figment of your imagination. I won’t exist when you wake up. Nothing lasts forever, Chaekyung. Look at what’s going to happen here.”

A light grows in the sky. It gets closer, and before it engulfs the Earth I recognize it as Andromeda. There’s a burst of star formation, and the Milky Way never looks the same again. The sky brightens with red light, the valley is incinerated and the stone melts away. The sun filling the sky pulsates for a while, then shrinks and fades to a flickering white dot. It grows colder than it has ever been, but there is nothing with which to coat the blackened ground with snow or ice. There’s no air left at all.

The stars in the sky wink and go out. For the longest time, nothing happens at all, but then I feel a change. The baryons themselves are decaying, and every atom left in the valley, mine included, fall apart. Soon only the Darkness remains, yet I can still hear Yena’s voice beside me.

_“Nothing lasts forever, Chaekyung. So enjoy your life while you can. But don’t pity the dead. Really, I’ve not a care in all the Worlds.”_

***

I wake up in the dark, in a funky mood. I can’t remember all the details of the dream, but the vibe of it is vivid. I check to see that Chaewon is still beside me, still breathing. Relieved, I finally notice the blinking light on the table.

It’s a message. From Naeun. I try to block the light of my phone screen from disturbing Chaewon’s slumber. The weird dream is pushed from my mind by what she’s said:

 _“It’s not your fault. True, you struck a nerve in me, but this is something I should’ve done a long time ago. I’m with_ _도연_ _언니 now, as I should be._

_“I’m sorry about Yena. I wish I could be there, to comfort all of you, but I don’t know what good I’d do. You still have each other. And you in particular: I’ve seen the secret looks you give each other. Go to her. Life’s not worth living alone.”_

I text her back, telling her about us, and about how happy I am for her.

**Author's Note:**

> The pace of infection has slowed dramatically here in Korea, so I guess I should've written this faster. Although there are not many April fans on this site, it seems, so hardly anyone shall read it anyway. So much for that!
> 
> But I am sure glad I am not back in the States right now, with the Great Orange Cabbage Patch Kid in charge!
> 
> Speaking of which, the beginning of Chapter 5 of Twice Trumped has a similar feel to what i was going for in Chaekyung's last dream.  
> https://archiveofourown.org/works/13710372/chapters/41478461
> 
> As for the title, well, while it was intended as an oblique reference to Chaekyung's nickname, that never filled a big role in the story. The bigger thing is that "corona" is latin for "crown" (as it is in other romance languages). So now you know!


End file.
